As far as HD reception goes, neither Dish nor DirecTV have a boatload of channels. That's one thing the cable companies keep touting (for now), is that they have more HD channels that either satellite providor. But all Sat. channels are digital, and unless you have digital cable, you're not getting that good a reception.
For us, cable wasn't an option, as we moved into a new subdivision, but about 750 feet off the main road. So when the cable company came, they told us they'd have to run "hard cable" down to our houses (we share a driveway with another house) and it would cost US (not the cable company) $2000. We said "FU" and got Dish. Plus, our monthly bill (although now we have America's Everything Pak, plus the Sports Pak, plus locals on 3 outlets) was cheaper and had more channels than cable.
As far as programming options b/w Dish and Direct, it's pretty much the same. Direct is a tad cheaper on some things, but when you start getting into movie channels, available channels, levels of programming, etc., it all about weighs the same. I actually have a spreadsheet of channels vs. cost that I did when I was thinking of switching to DirecTV from Dish--if you'd like it, let me know. The biggest 2 things I can mention are: DirecTV has NFL Sunday Ticket exclusively (they keep paying through the ass to the NFL to keep it) and (if you're into wrestling), DirecTV has NWA-TNA exclusively. It's not on Dish--instead of being syndicated or on a network like WWE, they do PPV shows each week for like $5-$10 a pop. Also, I think TiVo has it's own DirecTV box, whereas Dish has their proprietary PVR system. The difference being, Dish doesn't charge a monthly fee...but, they also don't do the TiVo stuff like watching your interests in programming, and then try to record programs it thinks you'd like. I really didn't care about all that (although it sounds cool), and I hated the idea of the subscription fee. But if you really want TiVo, I think it's compatible with Dish as well.
Hope all this helps!
